Time Magazine’s European edition has made a surprising move by spending its own dollars to distribute a free documentary on the Armenian Genocide. This was, perhaps, done to avoid anti-racist and genocide/holocaust denialist laws in Europe and also, as Artyom of iArarat has mentioned, to correct their mistake.

In June of 2005, the European edition of Time magazine distributed thousands of free copies of a supposed Turkish advertisement that included a documentary denying the Armenian genocide. Outrage around the world seemed to bring nothing at first.

Time simply published a response to a letter by saying, “TIME is an independent newsmagazine and does not endorse the views of any organization or government. We regret any offense caused by the advertisements.”

On August 1, 2005, California Courier published an article titled “TIME’s Chief Editor Claims Magazine Was Duped by Turks,” basing the story on a private communcation between TIME Inc.’s chief (now retired) Norman Pearlstine and myself, in which Mr. Pearlstine had answered me that TIME had apologized “for accepting a DVD whose contents were different from what we had been led to believe they would be.”

So what was the letter that had cought the attention? – According to the Courier, my reference to making Nazi flags.

Here is the full letter that I had received response to by Pearlstine:

I hope you have recieved the numerous complaints and
concerns regarding Time magazine's recent cooperation
with the Turkish deniers of the Armenian Genocide.

Are you ever going to respond to my letters?
Are you ever going to apologize for cooperating with
the Turkish deniers?
Are you ever going to publish an article that states
that Time has not intended to deny the Armenian
Genocide?
Are you ever going to admit your magazine's wrong
deed?

Oh, you are too busy to apologize, aren't you? Let me
guess! You are making Nazi flags to distribute in
Europe as a free speech, correct?

Regards, 

Simon Maghakyan

Pearlstine, with whom I later continued to keep private communication for at least another year, had answered me back saying,

Dear Sir,
	Your letters have been referred to the advertising department,
where they should have been sent in the first place. Editors are
responsible for stories and pictures. In addition, we have, of course,
apologized in the magazine for accepting a DVD whose contents were
different from what we had to been led to believe they would be.
	Norman Pearlstine

Interestingly, some Armenian pen pals, whom I had forwarded my letter, told me I was too harsh and yelling would not bring any good.I cannot find my very first letter to Mr. Pearlstine, but I remember mentioning the fact that Time had published a report back in June of 1960 calling Ottoman Turkey’s Talaat Pasha the inventor of genocide – “who introduced genocide to the 20th century by ordering the massacre of500,000 Armenians.”

Talaat introduced genocide by killing Armenians, you are introducing genocidel denial by spreading Turkish propaganda, I wrote.

Later Time (European edition) published full-page statements that condemned the sponsorship of the denialist campaign.

In April of 2006, Time named Orhan Pamuk (who later won the Nobel Prize) one of the top 100 influential in the world who had become “a global cause celebre” for having made a reference to “the genocide of Armenians in 1915 by the Turkish military.”

Orhan Pamuk was actually nominated for the top 100 for solely speaking on the Armenian genocide (and I think the same case could have been for his Nobel Prize award).  Harvard professor Samantha Power had nominated him by saying,

I nominate Turkish novelist Orhan Pamuk. He has acknowledged his homeland’s genocide against the Armenians and nearly got himself arrested before the Turks decided their commitment to and pride in their greatest writer exceeded a commitment to killers who died almost a century ago. It could bring a cultural change. Also George Clooney, for the obvious reasons, and the students who led the divestment movement on campuses for Darfur.

Time did the right thing, and it is time for Google to do the same. As of February 2, 2007, Google lists www.ermenisorunu.gen.tr (a website denying the Armenian genocide) as a Google sponsor when “Armenian genocide” is Googled.

As the Armenian Genocide resolution is reintroduced to the U.S. Congress, let us see what America is talking about America.

Among the several bloggers that have posted entries about the resolution are two of the Co-Sponsors themselves.  Rep. Pallone (D-NJ), for example, had announced the conference a day before it was reported in the news.  Rep. Schiff (D-CA) posted an entry at the same blog connecting the Genocide resolution to stoping the Genocide in Darfur:

The United States has a compelling historical and moral reason to recognize the Armenian Genocide, which cost a million and a half people their lives. But we also have a powerful contemporary reason as well — how can we take effective action against the genocide in Darfur if we lack the will to condemn genocide whenever and wherever it occurs?  With the new leadership in Congress, I am hopeful we can finally get this resolution passed. 

In the meantime, according to a transcript posted at www.state.gov, a State Department spokesperson was asked by on January 31, 2007, if the Department would “block even an open debate and democratic vote on this issue?” The answer was,

Lambros, our policy is clear. We mourn the victims of the tragic events of 1950. We have — 1915. We have never denied these events. The President recognizes these atrocities annually on Armenian Remembrance Day. We oppose attempts to make political determinations on the terminology of this tragedy.

The next question was as followed:

And a follow-up on it? The State Department, Mr. McCormack, apparently not wanting to interfere in the Turkish internal affairs was largely silent on the Turkish Article 301 under which murdered journalist Hrant Dink the other day was prosecuted and sentenced last year. And interestingly the Turkish Government exercised the same restraint. Can you describe for us any Turkish Government efforts to influence your government’s, Mr. McCormack, consideration of legislation on the Armenian genocide?

And the answer was very simple, “No.”

The American Embassy in Ankara, too, said Bush will stick to his policy.  A statement released on January 31, 2007, and received via e-mail, said:

Yesterday a resolution dealing with the tragic events that took place at the end of Ottoman Empire was introduced into the US Congress. The Bush Administration’s position on this issue has not changed. As I have said before, the Administration will be actively involved with the Congress to oppose this resolution.

Unlike in my previous message, where I referred to “some Turkish-Azerbaijani love” with sarcasm, I want to share a private communication with a Turk about whom I know very little, if anything. 

He/She had sent me a letter via my YouTube account (apparently after watching my five-minute film on Djulfa that, nevertheless, makes no mention of Turkey or the Genocide), and I had replied back.  Today I received more communication.

The Turkish friend wrote for the first time last week,

first of all im sorry that i dont know english well. im a turk. i just say im sorry for genocide. i accept genocide because i know old turkish politicians did too bad things. …im sorry…

I replied back saying,

Kardesim [or Kizkardesim] (my brother or my sister – in Turkish), my great-grandmother was saved by a Turkish woman in Urfa during the Genocide. As I will never forget what the Turkish politicians and the government did to my family and to my people, I will also never forget that Turkish woman – thanks to whom I live today.

And thank you for your letter. It means a lot to me.

And he/she replied today,

thank you… i cried when i read your message. i hope our nations have peace one day.
bizler gibi dusunen insanlar lazim bu dunyaya.
hoscakal ve sevgiyle kal 🙂

Today I Armenianized more non-Armenians, a.k.a, donated blood.  I think this is the best way of practicing nationalism or patriotism.  If you think your blood is better (which I don’t, especially when it is AB positive), you should donate it to make this world a better place.  This would make millions of, lets say, Turks to donate blood around the world. 

 Donating blood makes you healthy.  Until last year, I would get the cold at least 12 times a year in all of my life.  Since the first time I donated blood, I have not been sick and never will.

Donating blood is fun, in my case for the nurse or the nurses, at least.  These people had a lot of fun when I was playing Borat for them.  Wasn’t too much fun for me because they thought I was being myself.  Maybe some part of it.

 Donating fun will make you hate your computer less, at least in my case.  See, my home computer is the worst computer in the world (this is an absolute fact!!!!!!) and I couldn’t update my yesterday’s post after 10 attempts!  Now, as they have taken some blood of me, I don’t have too much energy to practice hate against my computer.  As Blogian’s readership is growing, I need to have a normal access to Internet, but this doesn’t seem the case.  So if I don’t respond to your comments, please don’t take it personal.  Usually, I approve them at work and cannot comment them from there.  If you notice, I don’t edit comments, and there is some Turkish-Azerbaijani love for Armenians in the comments.  But I do read your comments and get really excited especially when you link to Blogian!  One of my friends in Colorado, Kim Christianian, mentions my blog to everybody she sees.  I am serious.  She is the Blogian agent, and everybody is invited to be one.  🙂

Donating blood makes you feel good, despite the fact that nobody asks for an ID or whether you use/used drugs and alcohol.  What if Bin Laden wanted to donate blood?  Most likely not, and the same with the alcoholics or drug addicts, so don’t worry about getting intoxicated blood.

 So what makes you donate blood?  I don’t know the answer, but it paid well.  I was taking my independent study (on Cultural Rights and Djulfa) form for the dean to sign, and saw the blood seekers.  I told them I had to run, but ended up coming back.  I was told at the admissions office that it might take a week before the dean signed it.  I got a call, twenty minutes after I had dropped off the form, that my form was ready as I was already giving blood.  See, had I not volunteered I would have to do it on Friday!

As you noticed, my obssesion (or whatever the word is spelled.  I am not going to use spell check any more!) about Djulfa is becoming academic.  Indigenous rights scholar and very famous Native American Prof. Glenn Morris is going to supervise me on the research, and said many times he was really excited.  I will be also pursuing (and this is my own take) the state of Azerbaijani monuments in Armenia, so those of you who have some materials on the issue please let me know.  I would ask you not send me links to nationalist Azerbaijani websites that post photos of Armenian churches and say these were Azerbaijani monuments.

If Kirk Kirkorian ever ends up reading this entry, I would ask him to buy me a new computer.

The Armenian Genocide resolution was reintroduced in the U.S. House of Representatives today, January 30, 2007, reports Associated Press via Los Angeles Times.

Democratic and Republican lawmakers have introduced a resolution urging the government to recognize as genocide the deaths of 1.5 million Armenians at the end of World War I.

…

Turkey has adamantly denied claims by scholars that its predecessor state, the Ottoman government, caused the Armenian deaths in a genocide. The Turkish government has said the toll is wildly inflated, and Armenians were killed or displaced in civil unrest during the disarray surrounding the empire’s collapse.

After French lawmakers voted in October to make it a crime to deny that the killings were a genocide, Turkey said it would suspend military relations with France. Turkey provides vital support to U.S. military operations. Incirlik Air Force Base, a major base in southern Turkey, has been used by the U.S. to launch operations into Iraq and Afghanistan and was a center for U.S. fighters that enforced the “no-fly zones” that kept the Iraqi air force bottled up after the 1991 Gulf War.

The resolution (H. Res. 106) calls “upon the President to ensure that the foreign policy of the United States reflects appropriate understanding and sensitivity concerning issues related to human rights, ethnic cleansing, and genocide documented in the United States record relating to the Armenian Genocide, and for other purposes.” The full text of the resolution is available online.

Interestingly, one of the first to respond to the reintroduction of the Genocide resolution was Armenia’s tiny Jewish community. According to Global Jewish News,

Leaders of Armenia’s small Jewish community praised the resolution and expressed solidarity with the approximately 1.5 million ethnic Armenians killed between 1915-17, “because the histories of our people are similar and we too have gone through discrimination, tragedy and a genocide.”

This is perhaps in response to some Jewish groups (especially from Turkey) that lobby against the Genocide resolution, although at least one cosponsor of the resolution is of the Jewish faith. Israeli scholar Yair Auron’s “Banality of Denial: Israel and the Armenian Genocide,” which I finished reading last week, states that the resolution was pulled out in 2000 because Shimon Perez had written a letter to Clinton saying that Jewish lives in Turkey would be under danger if it passed. But more recently, a former Turkish FBI translator has claimed that then House speaker Hastert pulled out the resolution because he was bribed by nationalist Turkish groups in America.

Cem Ozdemir, a columnist with the Turkish Zaman, has published a surprising yet very welcoming entry about Armenian and Turkish relations. He asks important questions, and I think his column is the essence of a Turkey that the world wants to see.

Everybody — journalists, party leaders, the president of the republic, the chief of general staff — found harsh words to condemn the murder of Hrant Dink. But don’t they see that there is a link between what they are writing, saying and preaching in their daily professional lives and what happened to Hrant? How can one condemn his murder and still argue for the absurd Article 301, which brought him to court multiple times for nothing but his opinion?
How can one continue to argue that the border to Armenia should remain closed? Some are against opening the border because of the Armenian occupation of Azeri territory. But that’s all the more reason to take the initiative and establish good relations with your neighbors, thereby becoming the good broker in the process to negotiate a fair and just solution.
Those who continue to oppose the recent legislation on foundations don’t understand that treating Armenians and other Christians as second-class citizens was exactly what Hrant was fighting against.
How can one still be against Christians becoming officers, generals and members of parliament?
How can one still continue to declare as an enemy everybody who has another opinion than the official one on the events of 1915?
Just before Hrant was murdered, Sylvester Stallone became the new enemy. What did he do wrong? He supported the views of the majority of historians and experts in the world and described the events of 1915 as genocide. Even if one doesn’t agree with him, has anyone bothered to read the script of the movie he is planning? How many people have actually read Franz Werfel’s book about the 40 days of Musa Dag? Or does the fact that Werfel and Stallone don’t share the official views of the state automatically make them enemies? And if so, is it treason if I watch Stallone’s new film, “Rocky Balboa”? Recent commentaries on TV and in the papers that say this film too is now bad, even though it has nothing to do with his announced movie about Werfel’s book, are incredibly shortsighted.
In case it matters: I am still a fan of Stallone and his movies (OK, except for the Rambo series) and I look forward to seeing “Rocky Balboa,” just as I was looking forward to it only a couple of weeks ago. The difference now, of course, is that since last Friday, I don’t feel much like going to the movies?.
There is enough sadness in Hrant’s death. But it increases my pain even more to watch people talk about him and his heritage who never understood Hrant while he was alive. For all the talk about Hrant’s legacy let’s not overlook Agos, his Turkish-Armenian newspaper, which should persevere. Hrant’s death should not be used to make arguments in favor of or against Turkey’s accession to the European Union. Obviously, Turkey’s EU prospects were for Hrant — and remain for other people of different origins in Turkey — a chance to improve their rights. Nor should the death be employed in the debate surrounding the events of 1915. Hrant did not insist on recognizing the genocide as a precondition for a dialogue as some people in the diaspora do. But remember his words when he said that the Armenians know what happened to them.
One man come in the name of love
One man come and go
One man come he to justify
One man to overthrow
One man caught on a barbed wire fence
One man he resist
One man washed on an empty beach
One man betrayed with a kiss
U2 sang this song for Martin Luther King, Jr. I would like to dedicate it to my brother Hrant Dink.
Do they who betrayed him with a kiss know what they did?
Turkey produced both Hrant Dink and the 17-year-old boy who killed him. And let’s not forget the thousands of people who marched in solidarity and chanted, “We are all Hrant Dink! We are all Armenians!”
This is Turkey, and its future depends on whether it produces more Hrant Dinks — who live in the name of love — or more 17-year-old boys who kill in the name of hate.

Uncyclopedia – the stupid and funny encyclopedia – is worth browsing. I came across to it accidently, and enjoyed the entries about Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey.

Saakashvili, the democratic hero of the World

Again, this is supposed to be funny so no hard feelings.

Writing about Armenia, Uncyclopedia notes:

Armenia is a huge country located in between the Black and Caspian oceans. It is huge. Huge. It is popularly regarded that Armenia is its own continent, sitting between Europe and Asia, though this notion has no “official” status. The continent on which the continents of Armenia, Europe, and Asia lie can in some contexts be called Armeneurasia.

Armenians all walk around in public with a group of 10 because mexicans will kill them.

They think they are all related to alcapone or tupac shakur

They smell like garlic and have a big enough nose to stuff bombs(armenians are terrorists)

The entry on Armenia also teaches Armenian and how to become Armenian:

Investigate Armenia, decide where you came from sucks, decide to stay (this last part, the staying decision, has a 100% likelihood of happening and is irreversible since Armenia is the place to be). If you can’t find the country (which would be strange, because Armenia is also a continent and it’s where the action is), it’ll suffice to move to Southern California.Step 2: Add ‘-ian’ (or ‘-yan’) to the end of your last name. Examples:

• Bill O’Reilly = Bill O’Reillian
• Achmed Chalabi = Achmed Chalabian
• Dick Cheney = Dick Cheneian
• Joe Kowalski = Joe Kowalskian
• John Smith = John Smithsonian (note slight twist)
• Kate Moss = Kate Mossian
• Brian Eno = Brian Enoian
• Armin Tamzarian = Armin Tamzarianian
• Ching Chong = Ching Chongian

Coming to Azerbaijan, Uncyclopedia writes that it “is a friendly country that loves company; it has frontiers with Russia and Matrioshka in the north, Georgia in the northwest, Armenia in the west, southeast, southwest, northeast and even inside and Iran in the south.” It later tells about Azerbaijan’s porn industry and the Armenian heritage.

Georgia’s entry seems to be the funniest, with a great picture of the rose revolution.

Posting the Georgian alphabet, Uncyclopedia says, “The Georgian alphabet has 2 question marks, but noone knows why..”
Coming to Turkey, we find out that “Turkey is actually a myth; no country exists with such a name.”

And yes, Paris Hilton has decided to become Paris Hiltonian and move to Azerbaijan because she knows that Azerbaijan had proclaimed Holy Slap against Armenians.

A self-described independent blogger from Azerbaijan and Doctor of History Vulgar Seidov is writing in Russian the circumstances under which European parliamentarians and UNESCO would be allowed to visit Djulfa (Julfa or Jugha) – the site of the largest medieval Armenian cemetery that was wiped off the face of the Earth in December of 2005:

Путь в Джульфу европейским экспертам лежит только через разрушенные азербайджанские могилы и памятники в сегодняшней Армении и оккупированных азербайджанских территориях. Только после того, как каждый до последнего разрушенный и осквернённый азербайджанский объект будет наведан, задокументирован, зафиксирован европейцами, только после этого можно будет им сказать Welcome to Julfa!

(The road to Djulfa for the European experts lies only through [the examination] of destroyed Azerbaijani graves and monuments in modern Armenia and [in] occupied Azerbaijani territories. Only after that, when the very last destroyed and desecrated Azerbaijani object is visited, documented, and noted [fixed?] by the Europeans, only after that they can be told, “Welcome to Julfa!”)

Ironically enough, Armenia has agreed to the examination of the state of Azerbaijani monuments in Armenia by European experts. During such a visit last year to Armenia and Azerbaijan, the delegation was denied access to Nakhichevan where Djulfa lies. But you don’t tell this to Azerbaijani academicians, because they know it very well.

I agree that the price to visit Djulfa should be through the documentation of all Azerbaijani objects in Armenia (although I am not sure what Seidov means by “all objects”). There are Azerbaijani monuments in Armenia, and even if they all together do not have 1% of the significance of only one of the thousands of medieval Armenian cross stones forever gone in Azerbaijan, in the words of Norwegia’s former Ambassador to Azerbaijan, “Any kind of act of destruction toward any kind of historical monument of any religion, nation or people should be condemned.”

So why not go ahead and do it? Let’s have the delegation examine the ethnic artefacts and cultural sites of both countries. Although I have not seen reports of Armenian army or authorities destroying Azerbaijani monuments, I am sure Armenia is not an angel either – especially given the fact that even Armenian monuments are neglected in Armenia.
Unfortunately, it seems that the examiniation of Azerbaijani monuments is not Azerbaijan’s real intention. They don’t care about these monuments. They just want one thing – no foreigner witness what they have done in Djulfa. And here is how Seidov, for example, makes the transformation:

Да и вообще, я думаю тема памятников исчерпала себя и и её пора закрывать.

(And actually, I think, the topic of monuments has exhausted itself and it it time to close it.)

What was the whole point of Dr. Seidov’s post if he concludes that Armenian and Azerbaijani monuments should not be of concern?

Which of the listed don’t pay their gas bill in Yerevan?

1.    The poor
2.    The middle class
3.    The rich

The correct answer is 3 – the rich.  The gas bill collectors in Armenia go from home to home after the payment.  Knowing that my sister is a journalist, one collector complained to her that the prosecutors, judges and the “elite” in their neighborhood (people who have become super rich through corruption, bribes and direct thefts from national and local budgets) don’t pay one cent for their gas bill.  Whereas, the super rich use the most gas to heat their huge houses.

Is this why Armenia’s gas prices keep going?  Still wondering what would happen if the collection office cut their gas off?  If we still remember, one year ago Armenia’s cabinet minister of culture Hovik Hoveyan resigned after reports that he had “attacked and pistol-whipped electricity workers after a brief cut-off in power supplies to his apartment.”

Now, I can’t claim and don’t have evidence that all Armenian oligarchs and the several hundred thieves who own the most wealth in Armenia don’t pay the gas bill, but I am sure the bill collector made a reference to our direct neighbor, a prosecutor who built a huge house taking the site of Ararat from our eyes, and to the rest of our few super rich neighbors.

My sister feels so vulnerable that she expects every minute having their home taken from them of course without just compensation or consent.  One of our neighbors, who apparently doesn’t pay the bill and became relatives with Pres. Kocharian after they married off their children, has started a process of buying the entire neighborhood.  The poor people of the street are being forced to sell their homes – one of them the family of an 18-year-old boy who died in the war.  A cleansing of vulnerable socio-economic people takes place in downtown Yerevan and in other “desirable” areas.

American Ambassador John Morgenthau Evans has written a letter to the New York Times:

Re “Editor Who Spoke for Turkey’s Ethnic Armenians Is Slain” (news article, Jan. 20):

Hrant Dink, whom I met in Yerevan, Armenia, in 2005, was a fearless fighter for truth and human dignity. His assassination strikes a heavy blow against Turks, Armenians and all who strive for proper acknowledgment of the 1915 Armenian genocide and for reconciliation between the two nations.

His death should be a wake-up call: the last stage of genocide is denial.

John M. Evans
Sag Harbor, N.Y., Jan. 20, 2007